GeekSugar

Geek Tip: Email Comcast Corporate For Cable and Internet Help

GeekSugar — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 14:30:24 -0700

Last month I suffered the ultimate geek distress - an Internet and cable outage for over a week.

It inspired me to air my frustrations here, and the silver lining of the whole situation is that someone at Comcast saw my post and responded with a tip: if you're ever feeling like you're getting nowhere with the customer service on the phone, you can email the corporate team for assistance.

The corporate email address is We_Can_Help@cable.comcast.com. After my first problem was resolved, I used the corporate email address to get help with something else, and received a prompt reply, as well as a fix to a problem I'd had for a while.

Also, just writing an email definitely beats going through an automated menu for 15 minutes, only to repeat the same information to the customer service rep that you just punched in to four previous menus. Ugh.

Daily Tech: SpeakEasy Makes Recording on the iPhone Easy

GeekSugar — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 12:00:05 -0700

If you want the best iPhone voice recording app, download SpeakEasy. It may cost you $2, but it comes with auto-pausing and gives you many recording options.- Cool Hunting
Wait a minute, just when I get excited about Scosche designing an iPod Shuffle earphones adapter, I learn that Apple will be charging third parties a hefty fee for the privilege of making Shuffle accessories. Therefore, prices for third-party earphones and adapters won't be as cheap as previously hoped. - Engadget
Apple's iPhone 3.0 software debuts tomorrow, and rumors are swirling that it will include copy and paste. - Switched
It's finally official. The Windows Live Team has enabled POP3 access to Hotmail worldwide. - Lifehacker
Sony has just announced that it is teaming up with Comcast to unveil a co-branded interactive technology retail store. - Gizmodo

Daily Tech: Amazon Announces Kindle App For the iPhone

GeekSugar — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 12:03:41 -0800

I'm loving the fact that Amazon has just launched a free Kindle application for the iPhone or iPod Touch. - MobileCrunch
Eric Schmidt, Google's CEO, recently bashed Twitter at a Morgan Stanley technology conference, saying it was a "poor man's email system." - Valleywag
Check out an unboxing of a brand new iMac. - Engadget
A recent survey showed that 97 percent of Germans aged 19 to 20 would rather keep their cell phones over their partners. - Switched
Comcast is currently testing out a WiFi service at about 120 New Jersey Transit rail stations. - CNET

Do You Fear Monthly Internet Service Limits?

GeekSugar — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 02:45:01 -0700

Comcast dropped the bomb yesterday that it'll be placing caps on Internet service - 250 GB per month. When a customer goes over, they'll be contacted by Comcast and asked to curb their usage, and there's also a possibility that the company will charge $15 for every 10 GB over the limit.

Considering Comcast is the country's second-biggest Internet provider, this should affect tons of people (yours truly included), and in general, I'm wary of new limits on services. On the other hand, 250 GB is a whole lot of uploadin' and downloadin'; SFGate reports that the average user only utilizes about two or three GB per month. Of course, setting a limit now could set a precedent and usher in eventual lowered limits.

What do you think - are you bummed that Comcast is capping usage, or does it not make a difference to you?

Source

Daily Tech: Look Thinner, Younger, and Taller in Pictures

GeekSugar — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 12:00:06 -0700

Want to look thinner, younger, and taller in pictures? (Oh and get rid of red eye - like in the picture - too!) - Switched
Want to try an evite alternative? Check out Mobaganda, which makes online invites dead simple. The service creates a special web page for your event so you can send guests the link via link email, Twitter, or text - Lifehacker
If you love rats and LED lights you are in luck. These Ratatouille-esque LED lamps are surprisingly cute - Shiny Shiny
A CNETer shares his first 24 hours with Comcast and TiVo gives the rundown on the combined services. As you may expect, there are "likes" and "dislikes" - Crave
Look! Unpluggd editors are just like us. Well, kinda. They might have a better decorating sense - Unplggd

Have You Ever Suffered an Extended Internet/Cable Outage?

GeekSugar — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 15:45:52 -0700

Dear friends and readers, take pity on me. I have no Internet or cable at my house right now. Both services come from Comcast, and now I'm starting to see where that bundle deal was not such a great idea after all. The modem's probably broken, they say, and the only solution is to send someone out to our house. The catch? They can't come until tomorrow. That happened Monday (without even an apology for the outage, which would have been nice).

Since then, we've been living on a steady diet of season one Lost DVDs and video games (to add insult to injury, Little Big Planet keeps reminding me how fun online play is).

Sure, I should probably be using this forced disconnect time to read some books, maybe go on some long, thoughtful walks, but let's be real: I just want my Internet back (I'm whimpering). And cable and TiVo and Boxxee.

What I really learned this week is how dependent I am on these things - and that I really hate forced outages. Have you ever had to live a few days without cable, Internet, or both, against your will?

Source

Do DVRs Make You Out of Touch?

GeekSugar — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 13:12:20 -0700

I've been running an interesting experiment. OK, it's not really an experiment, it's the way I've been forced to live for the past week while waiting for my new TiVo. Here it is: Suddenly, I know when TV shows are on, and my butt is on the couch at certain times. I know what the current "hot" commercials are (if there are such a thing).

How do I feel about it? Well, for one, I hate not having a TiVo right now. Aside from missing its lovable little UI, icon, and bloop bloops, I'm highly inconvenienced. I actually have to be home at the right time so that I don't miss Lost. I can only go to the bathroom and get snacks on commercial breaks. I am a slave to network programming.

To see why I kind of like not having a TiVo, just read more.

On the other hand, I kind of like that I know when shows are on - in the past week I've been able to tell people what time or what channel a show they've asked about is on (so it makes me smarter). And when someone asks me if I've seen that hideously annoying new Comcast commercial, I can say, why yes, I have, about five times too many (see, smarter still). And I confess that I like having established breaks to get up at.

Still, I wouldn't trade it for having a TiVo and being able to watch TV on my schedule. That just feels like the normal, modern way to live for me. But in any case, it's been interesting knowing about schedules, channels, and all that jazz a DVR shields you from. I do feel more in touch.

So what about you - does having a DVR make you feel out of touch sometimes?

Source

Do You Appreciate When Services Apologize for Being Down?

GeekSugar — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 09:00:13 -0700

I was throwing a hissy fit yesterday when I saw that Netflix had still not sent me my Mad Men DVD, and then an hour later I got this in an email, explaining their outage. It wasn't the only outage this week: Gmail went down for a while on Monday, and then the next day, the Gmail Blog posted an explanation.

I gotta be honest: I'm not used to this kind of customer service. The transparency and honest "we screwed up" apology is not something I'm used to from a service provider; if my cable goes out, Comcast will hardly call me up to say, "Hi, we're so sorry your cable is out. Hope you didn't miss Project Runway!" All in all, I appreciate this straightforward behavior - these emails and blog posts were unexpected and a breath of fresh air, and make me happy to be a customer of Netflix and Gmail. What about you; do you care when you get apology emails like this, or does it not make a difference?

Warner Brothers to Offer Movies Earlier Online

GeekSugar — Thu, 01 May 2008 08:00:00 -0700

Don't get me wrong, I love being able to see a movie I missed in theaters as soon as it becomes available on DVD - don't we all? But in all honesty, it really doesn't bother me if I want to watch it on my cable pay-per-view service and wait a few months after the DVD release. Well according to The New York Times, Warner Brothers will now be offering video-on-demand systems on the same day they are released as DVDs.

Therefore movies will now become available a heck of a lot faster to users of online rental services like Apple TV, Comcast, Amazon and iTunes movie rentals. Warner Bros. is hoping that this new change will decrease the costs of manufacturing and distributing DVDs.